The present invention relates to pad printers. More particularly, the present invention relates to a versatile pad printing system.
Pad printing systems are used to apply high quality print, e.g. indicia, on non-flat surfaces. For example, pad printing systems can be used to print logos and the like on game balls such as golf balls. It will be appreciated that such printing must be carried out, not only on a spherical surface, but on a surface that is formed with dimples as well.
Conventional pad printing systems use a deformable pad which receives ink, transferred as an image, from a flat cliche plate. The plate has an etching or engraving of the indicia formed therein. Ink is transferred from an ink supply to the plate, and fills into the etched areas. The deformable pad is then pressed onto the plate and the ink is picked up by the pad. The image is then transferred to the curved surface which is to be printed. To re-ink the pad, in a commonly used arrangement, an inverted cup containing a quantity of printing ink is used to supply ink to the cliche plate. To apply a new coating of ink to the cliche plate, the ink cup and plate are moved relative to each other following each ink transfer operation.
Typically, the printing operation includes a variety of stations through which the pad is indexed, including a cleaning station, the ink transfer station and the printing station.
For the most part, pad printing is a very efficient method for printing images on spherical or other curved items. There are, however, several drawbacks to known pad printing systems. In conventional systems, the pads are mounted to a turret-like structure to move the pad between the various stations to pick up ink from the cliche plate, transfer ink to the printed item and clean the pad. The turret or pad support moves in one direction (as do the pads) as the pads are moved through the various stations. That is, the pads may all move in a (typically) vertical manner to pick up ink, transfer ink to the object (i.e., print) and clean the pad. In addition to the unidirectional movement of the turret and pads, in order to preclude complex designs, vis-a-vis extended movement of the pads or the printed objects, the cliché plates, cleaning stations and printed objects generally lie within the same horizontal plane as one another. That is, all of the movements are uniaxial and are generally within the same horizontal plane.
While the printing operation itself functions well, integration of the printing operation into an overall process can be difficult. This is due to the limited space that may be available to, for example, integrate a conveyor system for the objects to be printed into the overall operating scheme.
Accordingly, there is a need for a printing system that includes pads that move in non-parallel axes. More desirably, such a printing system is configured such that the ink is transferred from the cliche plate to the pad in a horizontal plane that is not required to be that same as the horizontal plane in which the ink is transferred from the pad to the printed object.